


A Scratch to Remember

by Kuroda



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Animaltale, Companions not pets, Cuddling, Everyone Deserves Hugs, Friendship, Fun Shenanigans, Gen, Glitched Timeline, I wanted an excuse to write something comforting, Non-binary Reader - Freeform, Nothing weird about this fanfict, Other, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Platonic Relationships, Slow Build, aiming for fluff
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-28
Updated: 2018-01-01
Packaged: 2018-12-07 18:38:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11629512
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kuroda/pseuds/Kuroda
Summary: You were just an average person, passing through the mediocrity that was life. At 23, you found yourself bored and living aloneFamily? They all had their own lives.Social life? You were a stiff, emotionless robot in front of people.Living a healthy lifestyle? Does relieving stress by internally screaming 24/7 count? No? Fine.Walking home one day, you notice something in the middle of the sidewalk. A strange cat with blue-stripes and... is that cat wearing a hoodie? You throw open the curtains and let the sunlight burn your eyeballs. A dog, with a long, red scarf around its neck, pants happily behind you. Opening the door, you are greeted by a small hamster sitting in the middle of your living room floor. And of course, the hamster was wearing a striped sweater. You: “...” Where do these animals keep coming from? What’s up with that mysterious, grinning cat? And why do you get the feeling that these are not your regular, everyday pets? Weak to all things cute and cuddly, you find yourself unable to abandon these creatures to live the rest of their lives in a cage, or out on the cold, neighborhood streets. But, did they really need you, or was it actually you who needed them? Only time would tell...





	1. The Unexpected Encounter

Loosely based on Trudy0816's Animaltale AU. Image and link credited below to the same person. **(I have received the artist's permission.)**

[ Click Here to see the original post](http://trudy0816.tumblr.com/post/145382954400/animaltale-au-just-want-to-draw-some-cute-animals)

It was dark. Autumn arrived nearly two months ago, bringing with it an increasing number of shorter days and chilly evenings.

You were walking back from work. You could have brought the car this morning, and drove the 20 or so minutes that it would’ve taken you to get home, but you loved being out on nights like these. 

The air was cold and crisp, _clean_ and easy to breathe in. Halloween decorations hung outside most neighbourhood houses, resulting in candle-lit pumpkins and spooky plastic props being scattered about. The dim, orange lighting gave the residential area you lived in an almost rustic charm.

Both earbuds in and with an upbeat song playing on your MP3 player, you strolled calmly down the familiar route home. An occasional breeze disturbed some wind-chimes, but other than that, it was pretty quiet. Looking around, you didn’t see anyone else on the streets. It was just you.

 _Hmm... weird._ Usually, there’d be a few late-night joggers or at least someone out walking their dog. Maybe it had something do with the fact that you were heading back late tonight. 

You worked at a couple of different part-time jobs. Manning the cash resister at a local grocery store, dishing out drinks at a local coffee joint, helping one of your previous professors organize his research data, etc. Whatever you could get your hands on and had a flexible schedule.

Today, you worked an afternoon shift at the Soup Spoon. It was little coffee place that sold, you guessed it, a variety of soups alongside their drinks. It was a weird little café, but you liked the atmosphere there. It was peaceful, and the room always smelled like tomatoes. 

You were one of three baristas behind the counter, mixing up overly-complicated and caffeinated drinks. What was supposed to be just a 4-hour shift today ended up turning into 8-hours when one of the evening worker supposedly called-in sick. 

After hearing the news from your boss, your two co-workers simultaneously looked at you with puppy-dog eyes, saying that they were going out tonight. You internally sighed at the sight of them silently begging in front of you and expressionlessly took on the extra shift. Its not like you had anything else planned for the night other than to go home and watch T.V. Besides, more hours meant extra pay.

Leaning in the opposite direction of a socially-inclined person, you preferred the comforts of your couch, your laptop, and a steaming cup of tea, over the blaring music at late-night parties and crowds of people whose names you’d never remember. 

It had been easier for you to make friends in high school. You were still generally quiet and reserved back then, but there was something about being stuck in close proximity with a handful of students everyday, for nearly three quarters of a year, that really made you get familiar with the people sitting next to you. After you graduated though, you never bothered to contact the ones whose phone numbers you’d saved. 

One summer, you ended up losing your phone, and thus, your only contacts became your family members, work, and some emergency services.

It wasn’t that you were adamantly _against_ having friends, or talking to people. Rather, it was that you were the sort of person that didn’t speak unless spoken to, and when asked a question, preferred to give the most concise of answers. So, yes, you were socially awkward to be around.

You’d sometimes stare into a mirror and wonder what kind of impression you gave people. _Cold_ , _serious_ , and _unapproachable_ , were the first three that popped in your head. Your neutral face just so happened to be the kind that immediately shut-down any strangers who wanted to start a conversation with you. Too bad you couldn’t bring yourself to care enough about it to try and make a change. 

The solitude was nice, and most of the time, you didn’t really mind being alone. It was tiring to always have to keep a smile on your face at work.

You graduated from UT University a little over a year ago. 

At first, you didn’t really know what to do with yourself, or with the two majors that you halfheartedly studied. You played with the idea of applying for a permanent career, but never really found anything that you wanted to devote your life to. 

However, once your brother flew overseas to study abroad, your parents finally decided that they were finished with their parenting duties and went their separate ways, leaving you on your own. With bills and food to pay, you naturally had to work, and so, you started picking up small jobs here and there, building up your resume.

Honestly, you couldn’t blame your parents. You had known that this was coming for _years_. Your father and mother were too different, incompatible. The fact that they both stuck around, tolerating each other for the twenty or so years it took for their children grow up, was commendable. 

They did their part. Were they perfect, role-model parents? Heck no, but they wholeheartedly loved you and your brother, and that was more than enough for you. You silently supported the love affairs that they nurtured in secret from one another. Both deserved to find their own happiness.

You occasionally kept in touch: a few lunches or dinners every month, phone calls every week, but now that they were free, you tried your best to keep yourself out of the picture. They left you the house, a car, and some money to get started on your new life. You didn’t need anything else. 

The days passed by monotonously. 

Your enthusiasm for pretty much everything had been slowly sapped out of you in University. Having lacked the energy to do the things you used to be passionate about, your life become an endless cycle of boredom and you found yourself escaping more and more into wild, self-induced fantasies instead. You’d spend your time imagining and playing around with interesting ‘what-if’ scenarios in your head whenever you weren’t focused on work, or distracted by bills and taxes.

There were times where things got pretty difficult. Sometimes, the intrusive thoughts that whispered in your ears grew louder or more _insistent._

Course, things weren’t all doom and gloom either. There were good days too, where the sunlight didn’t hurt your eyes, and you were able to stop and admire just how blue the sky was, or how green the trees were. You enjoyed those days. 

Recently, however, it felt like your good days were coming by less and less. 

Rather than a cycle, it was more accurate to say that the nice days were like short intervals between two long periods of negativity. Fortunately, the number of times your apathy struck also increased, which provided you with some much needed numbness in the emotional department, and helped you cope with this tipping balance. So, in the end, everything checks out, right? 

Yeah, you weren’t about to go and jump off this bridge that you’re currently crossing. So, yep, you were totally fine. Everything's just peachy.

You stop and cringe slightly at the dark sarcasm echoing in your mind. 

_Alright, that’s enough brain. Shut up and lemme walk in peace tonight. It’s been a long day._

You were almost there. Your house was less than a couple of blocks away, sandwiched between your neighbours’ two identical ones. 

One of the houses next to you had been sold off a couple of months ago, and was currently left unoccupied. You didn’t know the previous owner all that well, and your other neighbor, like you, kept to themselves most of the time. You saw the guy like maybe once every two weeks?

Distracted by the chorus of a particularly kick-ass song, you close your eyes for a bit. When you open them again, you are startled to see a white ball of fluff ahead of you, sitting in the middle of the sidewalk. Out of habit you immediately stop, not wanting to scare whatever animal it was.

Upon closer inspection, you’re pretty sure that it’s a cat... you think. The thing was, you've never seen a cat with blue stripes before. With it’s slightly chubby and rotund appearance, it was almost like meeting the inverse colour of Garfield... A SHINY! You encountered a shiny Garfield!

“...” 

_What the ever living fuck brain. This is NOT the time to be giggling like a school kid over some Pokémon reference,_ you chided yourself.

If your brain had a physical manifestation, you’d slap it right now. 

Wait. YOU were the physical manifestation. Alright. It had to be done. 

You resign yourself to your inescapable fate and face-palmed as hard as you could. Ow... _Note to self: Be more gentle with your face._

Your self-inflicted slap must have been louder than you thought, because the blue-striped cat nearly jumps up from the sound. It sharply turns its head back 180 degrees to look at you, and this time, it was clearly your turn to die from fright. 

You stood there for a minute, frozen on the spot.

_Holy shit that cat is smiling. It’s smiling at me. Why is it smiling? Can cats even smile? PleasefortheloveofGoddon’tbeheretotakemysoulorsomeshit._

A few seconds tick by. The cat makes no movement and continues to stare with, what you assume is, wariness in its eyes. One of the reasons you’d been so startled was because this cat didn’t have any whites in its eyes, instead, their blue irises glowed dimly against... were those two pitch-black voids its eye-sockets or its eyeballs? It was too dark for you to tell. You secretly hoped that they were its eyeballs. 

After another moment of mutual staring, the Goosebumps on your arms gradually settled down and your breathing returns to normal. Maybe if it was during the daytime, you wouldn’t have been scared shitless of a unique-looking cat, but right now, it was in the middle of the night and you were currently out, walking alone, when it was almost Halloween. So, yeah, you were definitely acting jumpier than usual. 

Having calmed down, and less inclined to turn around and flee for the hills like a crazy person, you went through several options in your head. Should you do what you normally did, and walk a huge circle around the cat so as to not scare it? It always left you feeling kind of guilty when you crossed an animal’s path and they ran or flew away from you in a panicked manner. 

Maybe you should walk closer and pet the cat. You've never succeeded in this second option, but every fiber of your inner love for the small, the cute, and the cuddly, was always itching to try.

Internally dismissing that idea, you attempt to walk around them instead, quietly musing over the thought of comically raising both of your hands and backing away slowly. In the back of your mind, you’d been curious this whole time over why the cat, despite having been startled by you earlier, didn’t choose to immediately run away like you expected. 

Half-a-step off of the sidewalk, and onto the road, you get a different angle on their legs. 

Three of them were tucked underneath its body, making the cat look like a loaf from your earlier position. You hadn’t thought much of it back then, but from this new angle, you could see that one of their hind legs was caught on something. The poor thing was stuck.

You hesitate for a second before taking a step towards them. Shouldn't you help set it free? Maybe if you approached it slowly, it wouldn't be afraid and let you help. You take another step and the cat lets out a low... growl? Its ears flatten, while a big, bushy tail spikes up from behind them.

You immediately stop in your tracks. Ok, nope. Plan-B. You stare into it’s blue irises, which lock onto yours. Man, did they look suspicious of you.

“Uh... heya, Mr. Cat. I’m not going to hurt you.”

One of its soft-looking ears briefly twitches forward at the sound of your voice, but other then that, it doesn’t move. 

_Ok, then. Good progress..._

“I’m just going to try and set you free?” The words came out sounding like a question instead. 

_What am I doing? It’s not like they can understand what I’m saying._ You weren't some sort of cat whisperer. 

Despite your inner turmoil over how stupid you must look right now, you take another step forward and stop when they bristle up again. 

Trying to lighten the mood, and maybe comfort yourself a little, you do what your brother would’ve done in this situation and start punning. 

“So... you’re looking pretty ‘glued to the spot’ there, buddy. I’ve never seen a cat so ‘tied-up’ in my life. Betcha you also think you’re in a pretty ‘sticky’ situation, huh?” You cringe at how much of stretch that last pun was. God, you were so bad. Your brother was way better at these.

To your surprise, the cat’s eyes had visibly widened when you look back. You are relieved to see that their fluffy fur was no longer spiking out so much, and both of their ears were now perked up. They stared at you with what you could only describe as, a perplexed expression.

Seriously? They didn’t react to your coaxing earlier, but _puns_ were the way to go? Sheesh, where was your brother when you needed him?

You took advantage of their lowered guard and take the last few steps needed to reach them. Alarmed, the cat tries to back away from you, only to stumble over their tied leg and tumble onto their back instead. They quickly roll to their feet, looking fearful. You felt bad for closing in on them. 

You crouch and raise both of your hands into the air, making a gesture of surrender. 

“Hey, hey. Calm down, I’m not going to hurt you.”

You motion to the thick plastic that had somehow twisted itself into a tight rope around their leg, tying them to a mailbox next to the sidewalk.

“I’m just going to free you. It’ll be easier than you trying to chew your way out. I have thumbs, see?” 

You wiggled your thumbs at them while rambling to yourself. At this point, you weren’t sure _who_ you were trying to console here, them or you? 

The cat just shoots another wary look in your direction and waves its tail back and forth threateningly. The way their small form was tensed up, gave you the impression that this sort of situation was the last place they wanted to be in right now.

“Ok. I’m going to try and untie you now. Please don’t bite me.”

You cautiously reach down a hand and grasp their leg. OK, OUCH. You immediately pull back your hand and inspect it. There were three, distinct claw marks on your skin. Beads of dark, red blood were beginning to flow from the wound, but the scratch itself wasn't that deep. _Thank God._

You glare at the cat in an accusing manner.

“Dude! What the heck did I _just_ say!”

If a cat could look indignant, you’d swear that this little shit was peeved at you. It turns its head to the side, ignoring your irritated expression.

 _Well, I did only tell them not to bite me, nothing about scratching._ You pinch the bridge of your nose with your uninjured hand and sigh deeply.

“Alright, ok, I get it. You’re stuck, you’re scared, you don’t like me touching you, but you can bet your sorry, blue-striped butt that you’re gonna be here, at _least_ , until dawn without my help. And guess what? You happened to get yourself stuck on the mailbox of a family with a pretty big doggo who fetches the paper every morning. I’ve seen this dog chase cats, rabbits, and pretty much anything smaller than it that can still move.”

The cat in front of you lightly trembles all of a sudden, its eyes opened wide like flying saucers. You blinked, a mix of both disbelief and shock on your face. Wait. They couldn’t have possibly _understood_ what you were saying right? You’d just been rambling to distract yourself from the blood.

Nah, it couldn’t be. You were probably thinking too much into this. Most likely, they were only frightened because you raised your voice. Calming down from your agitation, you hide your injured hand under the sleeve of your jacket, away from sight, and in a gentle voice, try coaxing it again. 

“There, there, sorry for yelling at you. I was just irritated for second because the scratch hurt, and I don’t really like the sight of my own blood. I’m going to try and free you again, but this time, I’ll do my best not to touch you, alright?” _So please, for the love of God, don’t attack me again._

Without waiting for some kind of affirmative response from them, you reach down and grasp onto the piece of plastic. You pause for a second, searching for a sign of resistance. Your shoulders relax again when there doesn't seem to be any reaction, and you get started on undoing the knot.

 _Damn it, this is hard._ The cat probably tried to forcibly remove itself from the plastic when they got caught, making the knot tighten up even more. 

Patiently, you worked on loosening and separating the plastic ropes from one another. Five minutes later, you opted to sit down on the sidewalk instead of squatting. The blue-striped feline silently watches you work. Occasionally, you felt their stare on the side of your face.

You didn’t pay it much attention, still focused on the task at hand. After another couple of minutes, you manage to loosen the most difficult part of the knot and quickly pull away the rest of the plastic, setting them free. 

The cat gingerly licks the spot where the ropes dug into their fur while you leaned back against the mailbox for a moment, massaging your sore fingernails. You observe them quietly. At close distance, they really were one weird-looking cat. Other than their blue stripes, which you had long chalked up to artificial blue-dye, their eyes were more animated and they seemed to carry a lot more expressions on their face than most of the other cats that you’ve seen. Looking at their leg, a trace of a smile played on the edge of your lips. Looks like you both needed a bandage.

You get up. 

Their eyes dart in your direction for a split second before looking away again. 

_Heh, guess they’re not the affectionate type._ Not that you minded, you weren’t really expecting a thank you from them anyways. 

You linger there for a moment, unsure if you should just go, or bring the cat with you and dress their injuries at your place before setting it free. You couldn’t recall any 'lost pet' posters of them being posted around, so maybe they were just out roaming.

It didn’t seem like the cat was going to be moving around anytime soon, so you decide to jog back home first and fetch some supplies.

Unlocking the front door, you stumble in and began fumbling for the light-switch in the bathroom. There were some first-aid sprays and bandages stored in the cabinets. You grab the small medical-aid box and head for the exit. After thinking about it for a minute, you turn around and went into the kitchen, grabbing a water bottle from off the shelf, as well as a small bowl from the pantry, before sprinting outside.

By the time you got back to where the cat had gotten themselves stuck, they were nowhere to be found. Scratching the side of your head, you looked around for them only to turn up empty-handed. You decide to drop a couple of bandages and filled the bowl with water before leaving.

The porch lights flicker and turn on as you walk up the steps to your house. 

You notice a stray, blue thread hanging off the edge of your sleeve when you stop by the front door, inspecting the scratches on your hand. You brush off the loose piece of string, thinking that it probably came from the cat’s clothes. 

You still as a wave of realization suddenly hits you. Wait.

_What was a cat doing wearing a hoodie?_


	2. And So We Meet Again

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You meet a familiar face in a not so familiar place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome! Thank you for reading. Kudos and comments are always appreciated~ ₍ᐢ•ﻌ•ᐢ₎

Over the course of the next few days, you made a couple of trips back to check the place where you left the bandages and a bowl of water. 

Other than finding the bowl knocked over on the third day, probably by a certain, very excited dog, neither looked like they’d been touched. 

You retrieved the bowl before heading back inside. 

\---

Sunday rolled around. 

You didn’t have work on the weekends and couldn’t think of a reason to go out, so you laid on the couch, staring lazily at your laptop. 

On days like these, you were always left feeling both bored and sort of lethargic.

For some reason, you haven’t been able to get that cat out of your head. A part of you wondered how they were doing. Did they make it back home safely or were they still out there? Was their owner taking care of their injuries, or had the neighbourhood dog already turned them into cat chow?

Mostly though, you just thought about how different they were from the other cats you’ve seen.

Those pair of blue irises, glowing softly the dark, left a deep impression in you, almost as much as their smile. 

You roll onto your back. 

Lifting your right arm, you stare at your bandaged hand, which hovered just above your face. The scratches were healing at a decent pace. 

You did your best not to pick at the scabs that had formed over the injury, and kept the whole thing wrapped up in some gauze. 

The image of that blue-striped cat was replaying constantly in your thoughts. You even clearly remembered how they snubbed you right after attacking your hand. Yet, despite their obvious indifference and suspicion over your attempts to free it, you still found them to be rather cute. 

You ran through your interaction with them that day, playing with countless different scenarios in your head. 

Would the outcome of your encounter have changed if you did this? Or, what if, rather than doing this, you had done that instead?

While you were lost in thought, you blindly tapped away at your keyboard and searched up a few questions on Google. 

‘Blue-striped cat’ led you to a Wikipedia on Tabbies, which looked nothing like the one you encountered. Googling ‘smiling cat’ on google images directed you to a page full of smiling kittens, but none of them quite managed to pull off a grin like the one you’d seen. 

Giving up, you decided to browse through the internet for some entertaining, non-cat related, videos to watch instead.

The afternoon quickly evaporated away, giving way into evening. 

You only noticed when the sky began to visibly darken, causing the bright, white light of your computer screen to glare back at you intensely. Too strenuous for your eyes, you rigorously rubbed at your eyelids before shutting the laptop and tossing it toward the other end of your couch.

Taking a look at your phone, you notice the date and immediately let out a groan.

“Uuuuuuuuuugh.” You had to take out the trash today.

Tuesday was garbage day. You worked an early shift on Mondays, which generally turned you into useless, half-asleep zombie for the rest of the afternoon. 

_Nah... I can probably put it off till tomorrow, right?_ Your lazy side tries to convince you.

The couch was suddenly a hundred times more comfortable now that you had something to do. However, you immediately shot down the idea of keeping idle there. You knew for a fact that you’d forget if you put this off until later.

_Get off this couch and take out the trash like a responsible adult. Get yer butt up!_

Sluggishly, you make it to your feet. Oops, you must’ve stood up too fast. 

Colourful specks of light flood your vision as gravity rapidly drains the blood from your head. You stretch, waiting for the dizziness to pass.

Crik. Crack.

Your bones let loose a series of sharp cracks and pops. 

_Ah, that feels better._

Grasping the last few, black garbage bags that you collected from your room, you push open the front door and exit the house. 

The cool, autumn air greets your skin as you step outside, a welcoming sensation after spending the whole day cramped up in your living room.

Feeling refreshed, you hum a light tune under your breath as you quickly start to organize which bag belonged in which bin. Leftover food and other organic trash was tossed into the green bin, while plastics were squashed in order to fit inside the larger, blue-coloured bin.

Finished, you drag the green bin, which was heavier, down the sidewalk and towards the end of the street, where your neighbourhood’s designated garbage-collecting spot was located. You notice that there were already a few bins scattered here and there from some of the other houses.

On your way back, you decided that you might as well take the long way around and stretch out your legs a bit. Spending the afternoon on the couch wasn’t ideal for your physical health.

You remember watching a video on YouTube that warned about the adverse risks of sitting down for too long. Although there wasn’t really a study that focused the effects of lying down, which better suited your habits, you figured that the consequences of both were similar enough. 

You were about to turn and head right, in the direction of your house, when out of the corner of your eye, you spot a familiar looking ball of fluff lying in the grass. The lawn was covered in overgrown weeds, but couldn’t hide the discernible blue-white figure from your eyes.

Walking closer, you find a familiar-looking cat sprawled on its side and unconscious. It was the same one you met the other night.

They looked scruffier and more worn out than when you last saw them. Their white coat was darker, probably from all the dirt and grime that collected in its fur, and their blue hoodie hung noticeably looser around its frame. 

You crouch beside them. An uncomfortable feeling washes over you as you immediately think of the worst-case scenario. _Are they dead?_

After hesitating for a moment, you gingerly place a palm on their back. You give their body a little shake, hoping that they’d wake up. 

They don’t. However, you are relieved to feel that their body was still warm. _A warm body means that they’re still alive, right?_ Right.

You look around. The house’s windows were blocked off, and a ‘For Sale’ sign was propped up next to the untended yard. It didn’t look like anybody lived here, so it’s unlikely that this was their home. Maybe they were lost? 

Remembering the cat’s violent response to your touch before, you briefly considered the possibility that they were a feral cat. 

It was strange. Normally, when someone had cat that liked to wander, they would place a tag around their neck in case they got lost or went missing. 

You frowned. No. If they had an owner around these parts, shouldn’t you have seen a lost-pet poster of them by now? The neighbourhood wasn’t _that_ big. On the other hand, a feral cat wasn’t likely to be wearing clothes either. Maybe there was a clue in their hoodie.

The little, blue hoodie that the cat wore had tiny, functional pockets. You checked those first, looking for a tag. Except for a single, tiny ketchup packet, they were empty. You stare at the small condiment pouch in your hands. What the heck. 

Shaking your head, you put away the ketchup packet before lifting the back of their hoodie. Maybe the owner’s address or contact information was stitched on somewhere. You get excited for a second when you see something sewn underneath in white thread.

Unfortunately, you didn’t manage to find either an address or number under there, just a simple, one letter word that read: Sans.

Was that their name? _Probably._

Finding nothing else, and still clueless about their origins, you decide to bring Sans back to your house first. You didn’t want him to die out here.

The poor thing had gotten so thin over the last few days. While carefully lifting him into your arms, you see that the injuries on his leg, from getting stuck in that plastic trap, had gotten worse. 

Some weird, unidentifiable liquid was leaking out, which dried and stiffened the fur around his ankle. You hoped that the liquid didn’t signify an infection in the wound. You felt a bit guilty about leaving him last time, maybe this wouldn’t have happened if you had brought him with you. 

Dispelling the negative thoughts that threatened to invade your mind, you focused your attention on getting Sans home. 

_Looking at his current state, he probably needs some medical treatment on that leg injury, some food and water, a warm shelter... maybe a bath too._

Kicking the door shut, you hurried into the kitchen and placed Sans on the counter, next to the kitchen sink, before running into the bathroom. You grabbed the medical-aid box from the cabinet and a couple of soft, fluffy hand towels from the hanger.

Returning to his side, you gently lift him to rest on-top of one of the towels. Not wanting to risk hurting or dropping him in the sink, you rinsed the wound with a cup of warm water, letting the towel absorb all the moisture. 

You rummaged through the medic box for some disinfectants, pausing to check if it was safe to use on cats. Getting an affirmative answer from Google, you sprayed some on the injury before gently wrapping it in two layers of gauze. 

With his leg all cleaned up and tended to, you carefully remove Sans’ hoodie and soak it in a bin of hot water. 

Leaving the dirty clothes in the sink, you wrung another wet towel and did your best to wipe the grime off his white, fur coat.

After drying him off with your last, clean hand towel, you carry Sans into the living room and propped him on the couch, using a couple of the softer, squishier, couch cushions to make him a makeshift cat bed. 

He was still unconscious, but looked much more relaxed now. He snuggled up against one of the pillows, expression peaceful, like he was taking a nap. 

_Oh god._ You resist the urge to emote your thoughts on how adorable he looked. Still, your hands automatically reached down. 

You pull out your phone and snap a silent picture.

For the next fifteen minutes or so, you try and clean Sans’ hoodie. Using a bar of soap and a sponge, you spend most of your time scrubbing off and removing the grass stains. After patting out as much of the water as you can, you leave it to dry on the reading table, next to the couch.

_He’ll probably be thirsty when he wakes up, and hungry._

You walk back into the kitchen and searched the pantry for some food that might be potentially edible to a cat.

After ten minutes of googling ‘can cats eat ______’ on your phone, you finally find something that you could give them. You were originally going to fill a bowl with some dry cereal and call it a day, but apparently grains were unnecessary in a cat’s diet, as were vegetables and milk. 

It turns out, eggs, cooked fish, and chicken were on the recommended list to give if store-bought cat food was unavailable. You didn’t have chicken or fish stocked in your fridge right now, but you definitely had eggs. 

You beat and scrambled two eggs in a non-stick pan, and cooked it without using either oil or butter. Transferring the eggs onto a plate, you carried it, along with a bowl of water, to the living room and placed it on the floor, a few feet from the couch. 

Satisfied with your work, you look at the time. 

_Crap. It’s already 8:30 pm._

You needed to wake up at 4:00 am in the morning to make it for your 5 o’clock shift. 

One of your previous professors, Dr. Gridley, hired you to help him sort out and run the numbers on some of his research data every week. All you had to do was turn his jumbled up and disorganized notes into a couple of coherent, PowerPoint slides for him to use in his morning lectures. 

Because the software necessary to graph the data was only available for free on the computers in his lab, you had to get up early every Monday and walk to the University to help him prepare. Well, you could drive, but the distance was only 20 minutes on bike and you liked to save gas.

You take one last glance at the sleeping cat on your couch before heading upstairs. Mondays were crap, but you couldn’t help but feel a bit of anticipation for the morning. Sans should be awake by then. You’d figure out what to do with him tomorrow. 

After brushing your teeth, you finally crawl into bed, exhausted. You didn’t do any hard, physical labour, but you definitely felt mentally drained.

Taking out your phone, you flip to the picture you took of him earlier. _Maybe I should set this as my background picture._

After doing that, you set it aside on the nightstand. Your eyes begin to droop, so you close them. It's nice to have another living being in the house. 

“...”

You snap awake and bolt up all of a sudden, kicking off your blanket in the process.

 _Shit._ **You forgot to take out the recycling.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for getting the second chapter out so late! (☍﹏º)｡
> 
> I've been busy with my studies during the last few months and neglected this fanfict. I also have a main story I'm working on right now, so updates on this feel-good story will be sporadic and unevenly spaced out. My apologies in advance! (￣△￣；)


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